L’Encyclopédie de l’histoire du Québec / The Quebec History Encyclopedia

History
of Canadian Indians

1763-1840

[This
text was published in 1914. For the full citation, see the end of the
document. To be true, Duncan Scott uses much vocabulary that is rejected
in the social sciences today. His attitude is judgmental and paternalistic.
His hero is Sir William Johnson who sought to protect Indians, especially
against American encroachments on Indian lands. He readily uses stereotypes
and does not question the right of the British to "civilize" the Indians.
While this text is dated, it still provides much information of value
on the indigenous population of Canada
in the period under study.]

-
I -

THE
GOVERNMENT AND THE INDIANS

CIVILIZATION
THE IDEAL

THE
time divisions which are convenient for the larger purposes and scope
of this history have no significance for Indian affairs. The administrative
changes which occurred in 1763 and 1841 did not affect the Indians in
their government, and the date of Confederation serves but to mark the
responsibility for Indians then cast upon the Dominion. The year 1830
may be fixed as the limit of the first regime in Indian affairs. Before
that date a purely military administration prevailed, the duty of the
government being restricted to maintaining the loyalty of the Indian
nations to the crown, with almost the sole object of preventing their
hostility and of conserving their assistance as allies. About 1830 the
government, with the disappearance of the anxieties of the first period,
began to perceive the larger humane duties which had arisen with the
gradual settlement and pacification .of the country. The civilization
of the Indian became the ideal; the menace of the tomahawk and the.
firebrand having disappeared, the apparent duty was to raise him from
the debased condition into which he had fallen owing to the loose and
pampering policy of former days. Protection from vices which were not
his own, and instruction in peaceful occupations, foreign to his natural
bent, were to be substituted for necessary generosity. When the Dominion
in 1867 gathered up and assumed the responsibility of the colonial governments
to the Indians of the provinces this policy was not changed, but a great
expansion in its current occurred, and the development of the new western
territories largely increased the burden.

It
will be seen that the treatment of the relations of the government to
the Indians cannot naturally be broken up into the same periods as the
political history, and it has been thought convenient to deal in the
first period, from 1763 to 1841, with those subjects which are germane
to the military superintendence of the Indians ; in the second period,
from 1841 to I867, with the first attempts to protect, civilize and
educate them ; and in the third period, from 1867 to the present time,
with the advancement which has taken place among the Indians of the
older provinces, the obligations which have arisen with the new political
divisions of the country, and with the efforts made to meet them.

FRENCH
AND BRITISH POLICY CONTRASTED

The
policy of the French crown was, in at least one essential particular,
different from that of the British government. French discovery meant
conquest so far as the Indian was concerned. Whatever interest was to
be shown, whatever favours were to be granted, flowed from the clemency
of the crown ; the Indian in himself had no title in the soil demanding
recognition, nor, in his inferior position as a savage, had he any rights
which could become the subject of treaty or negotiation. When the French
standard was set up the Indian passed at once from undisputed possession
of his ancestral domain to a mire precarious occupation. His land was
parcelled out and patented without his consent; his hunting-grounds
were constrained by feudal tenure and customs, without tribal or individual
acquiescence. In theory he was not to be treated cruelly or unjustly;
he was, in fact, the object of immense curiosity and of a passionate
desire for the welfare of his soul, out of which arose a spiritual conflict
which has covered the early Jesuit missionaries with the mantle of heroic
martyrdom. Little plots of land were set apart for him, and seigniories
were granted that he might be fostered and educated, and, above all,
christianized; but the acknowledgment of any right or title to the soil
was absent.

From
the earliest times the policy of the British government was marked by
an essential contrast. One of the first recorded instructions to British
colonial governors, issued by Charles II in 1670, declares the justice
that is to be shown to the Indians, and directs that persons be employed
to learn their language and that their property be protected. After
the enumeration of civil rights came the direction that the governor
was to consider how the Indians might be best instructed and invited
to the Christian religion. These words were merely the enunciation of
a former policy, for earlier in the seventeenth century. lands had been
ceded with due formalities and for definite considerations, and treaties
and agreements had defined the civil relation of the aborigines and
the ruler. It was the British policy to acknowledge the Indian title
to his vast and idle domain, and to treat for it with much gravity,
as if with a sovereign power. According to the doctrine of English law,
the lands occupied by the Indians before the Conquest vested thereupon
in the British crown; the Indians continuing to occupy under the crown
by a sort of precarious title. That title may exist merely as policy,
but it has actuated all the British dealings with the Indians ; and
while it sprang in the seventeenth century from ideals of right and
justice, it could be understood and interpreted in the nineteenth by
the law lords of the crown in the following words : 'There has been
all along vested in the Crown a substantial and paramount estate, underlying
the Indian title, which became a plenum dominium whenever that
title was surrendered or otherwise extinguished.'

RISE
OF DEPARTMENT OF INDIAN AFFAIRS

The
idea that there existed something in the relations of the white man
with the Indian which demanded more than casual attention, which in
fact required special training and study, is formulated in the instructions
of 1670 to which reference has just been made. Persons were to be employed
to learn the Indian languages, and from this special class of official
intermediary or interpreter rose the separate department of the government
which was to be charged with the supervision of Indian affairs, and
the oversight by which traditional policy should be expanded to meet
the needs of advancing civilization. In New France the affairs of the
Indians were merged in the government of the country ; there was no
officer or board of commissioners designated to control or influence
the conduct of the natives ; the missionaries were free agents for evangelization,
but had no official standing; and the nerves of policy spreading from
the central authority were therefore neither numerous nor sensitive.
The British colonial government began early to appoint officers to conduct
Indian affairs, the first on record being Arnout Cornelius Veile, a
special commissioner to the Five Nations in 1689. Commissioners were
appointed in 1696 by the government of New York for the Indian management
and control ; at first they were four in number, but had increased in
1739 to thirty. Abuses crept in where authority was so diffused, and
the hand of a strong man was needed when William Johnson was appointed
Indian agent by Clinton in 1744. From that date to the present there
runs through the Indian administration a living and developing theory
of government.

The
policy formulated by this great prototype of all Indian officials has
been the foundation of the British control of Indian affairs; varied
by changed conditions, it dominates the present administration. In a
letter to the Earl of Shelburne, dated January 15, 1767, he thus states
his policy:

"We
should employ men acquainted with their manners to put forth measures
adapted to win upon their affections, to coincide with their genius
and dispositions, to discover all their designs, to prevent frauds
and injustice, to redress grievances, to remove their jealousies and
apprehensions, whilst by annual or other stated congresses, as practised
among themselves, we mutually repeat our engagements, refreshing the
memories of those who have no other records to trust to-this would
soon produce most salutary effects ; their apprehensions removed,
their attachment to us would acquire a solidity not to be shaken,
whilst time, intercourse with us and instruction in religion and learning
would create such a change in their manners and sentiments as the
present generation might live to see ; together with an end to the
expense and attention which are as yet so indispensably necessary
to" attain these great purposes and to promote the safety, extend
the settlements and increase the commerce of this country."

What
Sir William Johnson thought of his charges he may be allowed to state
in his own words:

"Now
as the Indians who possess these countries axe by numbers considerable,
by inclination warlike and by disposition covetous (which last has
been increased from the customs in which the French have bred them),
I find on all hands that they will never be content without possessing
the frontier, unless we settle limits with them, and make it worth
their while, and without which should they make peace to-morrow they
would break the same the first opportunity . . . . I know that many
mistakes arise here from erroneous accounts formerly made of Indians
; they have been represented as calling themselves subjects, although
the very word would have startled them, had it been ever pronounced
by any interpreter. They desire to be considered as Allies and Friends,
and such we may make them at a reasonable expense and thereby occupy
our outposts, and carry on a trade in safety, until in a few years
we shall become so formidable throughout the country as to be able
to protect ourselves and abate of that charge ; but until such measures
be adopted, I am well convinced, there can be no reliance on a peace
with them, and that as interest is the grand tie which will bind them
to us, so their desire of plunder will induce them to commit hostilities
whenever we neglect them."

This
was clearly a policy of necessity. To keep the Indians at bay by friendship,
to distrust them profoundly while cementing treaties with them, to heal
each treachery with the salve of presents, to be ready with ample rewards
for negative services - these were to be the actuating principles until
the increase of population should abate the terror of the savage, and
the pressure of civilization should turn him into a peaceful subject.

-
II -

SIR
WILLIAM JOHNSON AND THE SIX NATIONS

A
GREAT ADMINISTRATOR

WHEN.
the influence of France disappeared from the northern part of the continent,
the system which had been developed by Johnson was extended to the new
territory; Quebec became part of the Northern Indian department, and
Johnson's successors endeavoured with varied success to imitate and
continue his policy. When he found the Northern division of the Indian
department enlarged by the conquest of Canada , he appointed deputies
for the new territory, and extended his organization to meet the demands
of the time. In 1763 he informed the Lords of Trade regarding the Indian
population of his department. He enumerated the number of men as follows
: - Six Nations, 2,030 ; Indians of Canada in alliance with the
Six Nations, 630 ; Indians of the Ohio, 1,100 ; Indians of the Ottawa
Confederacy, 8,020. Although he does not compute the total population
of all ages and of both sexes, it must have reached 42,000. After the
Revolutionary War probably not more than half that number were to be
found on British territory; but until after the negotiation of Jay's
Treaty, and the transfer of the western posts to the United States government
in 1796, they were all under the real or assumed protection of the crown.

Johnson's
power over the Indians, beginning first with his influence over the
Six Nations, arose from their instinctive perception that he was honest
with them, and that his allegiance was no mere pretence in order to
subdue or deceive, a perception which was fortified by countless proofs
of his disinterestedness. This has been, and we may yet hold it to be,
the chief power in British relations with the native races, even though
we may point to men who have abused the opportunities given them by
this traditional power. In the Six Nations he was dealing with the highest
aboriginal type of the northern half of the continent - a people who
had armed their confederacy for peace purposes and who forced peace
upon the conquered tribes; a people who had developed a form
of government which suited admirably the genius of the race, and which
might have developed into something even higher but for the arresting
and diverting hand of European civilization.

THE
GREAT CONFEDERACY

The
Six
Nations had not only forced the conquered nations into alliances,
but had even impose, upon them many of the peculiar customs of the League.
As, therefore, the relations between the government and all the Indian
nations were coloured and influenced by the practice of the great Confederacy,
it might be well to devote a few words to the outstanding features of
their form of government. According to the traditions, before the formation
of the League the five aboriginal tribes were hostile to each other,
but were brought together and the League constituted by the wisdom of
Da-ga-no-we-da,
a sage of the Onondaga nation. The character of the League was determined
by forms of government already existing among the nations, which must
have been of slow growth. Da-ga-no-we-da, the traditional lawgiver,
who, by reason of an impediment in his speech, chose Ha-yo-went-ha
(Hiawatha) as his speaker, established what had been the practice throughout
many years, and gave it form and stability. The supreme power resided
in a council of fifty sachems, who bore traditional names and whose
positions were hereditary in their several nations. Of these, nine were
allotted to the Mohawks, nine to the Oneidas , fourteen to the Onondagas,
ten to the Cayugas and eight to the Senecas. They held equal authority,
and the sachems of each nation ruled their people as the whole council
of sachems ruled the national affairs. Their political edifice was the
Long House, erected with its door opening upon the west. In order of
precedence the nations stood as follows : the Mohawks,
the Onondagas,
the Senecas,
the Oneidas
and the Cayugas.
The Tuscaroras, the sixth nation, who were not admitted to the League
until 1715, had not an equality with the original five nations, and
upon their entrance no increase was made to the fifty sachem. Later
in the history of the League an order of elective chieftainships was
formed. Many Indians known to history - Red Jacket, Brant and Cornplanter,
for example - were chiefs of the later order ; these subsidiary chiefs
never sat as sachems in the order of the League, but in time gained
great influence. Each nation was divided into eight tribes, and the
tie of consanguinity was powerful between each tribe. A member of the
Heron tribe of the Mohawks was brother to the Herons of the Senecas
; or a member of the Beaver tribe of the Cayugas was brother to the
Beavers of the Oneidas . 'With the ties of kindred as its principle
of union,' to quote from Lewis H. Morgan's League of the Iroquois,
'the whole race was interwoven into one great family, composed
of tribes in its first subdivisions ; and the tribes themselves, in
their subdivisions, composed of parts of many households.'

The
stability of the League was ensured by this interweaving of kith and
kin, and the permanency and strength. of the bond is proved by the constancy
of the League as a whole to the British side in the Revolutionary War.
The Oneidas and Tuscaroras alone openly favoured the Americans, and
even they were always wavering, always being influenced by the spirit
of old times and old customs. A more serious division in the ranks of
the Six Nations would have meant for their a desperate civil war, involving
every warrior in the guilt of his brother's blood.

Descent
was fixed in the female line, and thus it was assured that the sachems
would be of the same tribe as the original holders of the position.
A survival of the days when the woman was wife to all members of the
tribe of which her husband was a member - this was the only way of securing
purity of descent. The son of a marriage was not the son of his father
but of his mother ; he could inherit from his sire neither honours not
property. If his father were a sachem, the office was open only to choice
from among the descendants of his father's brothers or sisters.

In
their great councils, which could only be summoned by the Onondagas,
who were the guardians of the council fire, business was conducted with
high formality, and absolute unanimity was necessary to the decision
of any question. The unanimity was assisted and almost assured by a
system of concurrence between sachems of the same class. Each department
of the national life, and every relation of family intercourse, was
woven through with subtle bonds and filaments of association. It is
not necessary to pursue the subject deeper into its labyrinths; enough
has been said to make clear the nature of these master Indians who so
long troubled the British with their intrigue and strategy.

Johnson
entered into the spirit of their policy, used their imagery, spoke to
them perpetually in Wampum, and kept the council fire fed with wood
that made the brightest and warmest flame. In 1763 the Indians of the
newly created government of Quebec, and the Indians of the West, saw
his name signed to the proclamation of that year, which gave them a
strong protection and an acknowledged title to their lands ; and they
might feel, indeed, to use the figurative language of the council fire,
that a tree had been set up whose branches were large enough to afford
shelter for them and all their brethren to come and consult under it.

INDIAN
RIGHTS GUARDED

It
is a comment on the importance of the Indian question in those days
that at least one-third of the Proclamation of 1763 should have been
devoted to defining the protection to be accorded to the Indians and
their property and trade. After the four new governments of Quebec ,
East and West Florida and Granada had been erected and their administration
provided for, the proclamation turns to the Indians:

"And
where it is just and reasonable and essential to our interest and
the security of our colonies that the several nations or tribes of
Indians with whom we are connected, and who live under our protection,
should not be molested or disturbed in the possession of such parts
of our domains and territories as not having been ceded to us are
reserved to them or any of them as their hunting grounds."

So
runs the preamble, followed by instructions to the governors that no
warrants of survey or land-patents are to be granted beyond the bounds
of their districts. All the land except that granted to the Hudson 's
Bay Company, and also all the land to the west of the head-waters of
rivers 'which fall into the sea from the West or North-West,' were reserved
for the Indians. No purchase or settlement was to be allowed, and all
squatters were to remove from these unceded lands. No private person
was to presume to negotiate a land-purchase from the Indians, but 'if
at any time any of the said Indians should be inclined to dispose of
the said lands the same shall be purchased only for us, in our name,
at some public meeting or assembly of the said Indians to be held for
that purpose by the governor or commander-in-chief of our colony.'

Trade
with the Indians was to be free ; but the prospective trader had to
take out a licence, and he was to give security that he would observe
all regulations imposed from time to time. Five years after the date
of this proclamation, at Fort Stanwix, the great treaty was signed which
determined, for the time being, the western boundaries of the colonies
and defined the vast unpurchased Indian domain lying farther west. The
treaty grew out of the proclamation ; Johnson negotiated the one, his
influence can be traced throughout the wording of the other, and his
strong will dominated affairs even after his death and well into the
first decades of the nineteenth century. It was by his methods that
the Indians were controlled during the Revolutionary War, and amid the
uncertainties of the eleven years from 1783 to 1794 between the signing
of the Treaty of Paris and the signing of Jay's Treaty.

The
outstanding events in which the Indians played an important part during
these troubled times were the Revolutionary War, the peaceful settlement
of the Mohawks on the Grand River in Upper Canada , and the contrasting
hostilities surrounding the Indian claims to the western country.

In
order to understand the position of the Indians after the close of the
Revolutionary War, when they were rolled back upon Canada, it will be
necessary to glance briefly at the events between the years 1774 and
1783. Throughout the spring and early summer of 1774 the strained relations
existing between the American colonists and the government caused the
Indians much uneasiness. They had been approached by emissaries who
attempted to educate them-in the rebel politics, and Johnson was active
in allaying their fears. The burdens of such unrest as preceded the
cataclysm were too great to be borne by a man already enfeebled, and
Sir William died suddenly on July 11, 1774, immediately after an important
conference with the Six Nations. His death threw the Indians into a
panic, and if it had not been for Johnson's foresight the results might
have been serious. He had recommended as his successor Colonel Guy Johnson,
his nephew and son-in-law, who at once took up the reins of government,
and was later confirmed in office.

-
III -

THE
INDIANS AND THE WAR OF THE

REVOLUTION

ATTACHED
TO THE BRITISH

THE
intrigues for the neutrality or active sympathy of the Indians continued,
but more openly. Early in the year 1775 the revolutionary party had
begun a correspondence with the Six Nations through their missionary,
the Rev. Samuel Kirkland, who had great influence over them. Colonel
Johnson endeavoured to have him removed from his station, but the Indians
objected. They found their best friends on opposite sides ; and shortly
after their effort on behalf of the disloyal clergyman they had to intervene
on behalf of their loyal superintendent, and protest to the Tryon County
Committee against any restriction upon his liberty. 'The love we have
for the memory of Sir William Johnson,' they urged, 'and the obligations
the whole Six Nations are under to him must make us regard and protect
every branch of his family.'

Underlying
the protestations of both sides that their efforts were directed solely
toward maintaining the Indian neutrality, there must have been the hope
that the neutrality would pass, and that active armed support would
ensue. Colonel Johnson, finding that all necessaries for the Indians
were stopped by order of the committees, left his headquarters in May
1775, proceeded to Oswego and thence to Montreal , holding councils
on the way with the Indians. He was accompanied by Joseph Brant and
by a large body of Mohawks, who never again returned peacefully to their
old homes. At the same time the Continental party were not idle, and
won the friendship of the Oneidas and Tuscaroras; but during the war
they wavered, and even these nations were scattered between the two
camps. In 1780 Colonel Johnson reported that the major part of the disaffected
tribes had returned to their allegiance. The first occasion on which
the Indians took part in the hostilities was at St Johns, in the summer
and autumn of 1775 ; the Mississagas were there actively associated
with the Indians of the St Lawrence. But Governor Carleton would not
allow them to cross the frontier, or, to quote his own language, 'to
let them loose on the rebel provinces lest cruelties might have been
committed and for fear the innocent might have suffered with the guilty.'

Gradually
the separation of the nations from their ancestral domains was accomplished.
Sir John Johnson, with certain of the Six Nations who had not joined
Colonel Guy Johnson and Brant, fled to Canada in 1776 ; and the great
council fire tended by the Onondagas since the formation of the League
was extinguished. The council at which the Six Nations were finally
persuaded actively to support the British by promises of reward and
protection, and by a liberal supply of presents, was held at Oswego
in the summer of 1777. Colonel John Butler was there with Captain Caldwell
and Brant; and then began a lurid chapter of warfare in the Indian manner,
with episodes of flame and the torture stake.

It
would be unprofitable to trace events with minuteness. It is doubtful
if the Indian allegiance was of any real benefit to the British. Neutrality,
if it could have been obtained, would have been a jewel of price to
both sides; but Britain gained the costly prize of a savage ally. The
Indians were at all times moody and fickle fighters, eager to be purchased
every season with a new supply of merchandise, and quick to imagine
slights and insults. There was ever present the fear of their treachery
the fear that some last offer from the Americans, such as was constantly
being made, might please

their
whim ; even Lafayette in 1778 addressed himself to the task of winning
the Canadian Indians. Guy Johnson gives this detailed list of their
exploits in the campaign of 1780 : 'They have killed and taken 14 rebel
officers and 316 men, and destroyed 714 houses and granaries full of
grain, with 680 head of horses and cattle, 6 small forts and several
mills'

The
close of the war found the powerful Confederacy crowded about Niagara
. Their exploits had not been of a nature to bring them wealth or even
means of subsistence, and they were pensioners on the bounty of Great
Britain . Indians are never slow in making demands, and a promise sinks
into their minds and becomes as perdurable as an index of brass. The
Six Nations had been promised by Carleton, and the pledge had been renewed
by Haldimand, that they should be placed in as favourable a situation
at the close of the war as they enjoyed in their former 'castles.' They
remembered and urged the fulfilment of this promise, and pressed for
the payment of their losses. Great Britain paid these at their own valuation
of £15,000 ( New York currency), and she purchased for them from
the Mississagas for £2,000 a fertile tract extending down the
Grand River from its source to its mouth. A portion of the Mohawks settled
at the Bay of Quinte under the chief Deserontya, whose name is preserved
in Deseronto, the name of a town near the reserve. The Six Nations still
reside near Brantford upon the 49,696 acres which remain of their grant,
the greater portion having been sold for their benefit, and keep up
a lively semblance of their traditional form of government.

The
treatment of the Six Nations and other friendly tribes on British territory
after the close of the war was a matter merely of spending money and
giving lands, but the Indian problems arising from the Treaty of Paris
were more difficult and dangerous. The Indians who considered themselves
the allies of Great Britain , bound to suffer or profit with her, expected
that they would be named in the Treaty of Paris, and that their old
treaties would be confirmed and respected. General Haldimand, writing
to Lord North in November 1783, told him that the Indians had as enlightened
ideas of the nature and obligations of treaties as most civilized nations,
and knew that no infringement of the treaty of 1768 fixing boundaries
between their country and the North American provinces could be binding
without their consent. When those residing in the newly formed republic
realized that they were at the mercy of the Americans, their surprise
was equalled only by their scorn. They had been neglected by the power
whose understanding of the sacredness of treaties they had imagined
to be as pure and lofty as their own. They never ceased to advance and
support their claims by clear and simple reasoning until their voice
was hushed in defeat; and, having proved by this appeal to arms the
justice of their contention, the right for ever remains on their side.
They were capable of urging their case in such straightforward language
as follows:

"The
King surely would not pretend to give the Americans that which was
not his to give ; and would not believe that the Americans would accept
that which the King had not power to give. They were allies of the
King, not subjects, and would not submit to such treatment. They had
given the French King right to establish posts along the waterway
between Canada and the Western Indians in the heart of their country,
for trading purposes only, no land, and after the war [i.e. Pontiac's
war] granted to Sir William Johnson to hold these forts for their
ally the King, but this gave the King no right to grant these lands
to the Americans. They would look for favours from neither, nor would
they be aggressors, but would defend their own. If England had done
so it was an act of cruelty and injustice and capable only of Christians.
"

They
afterwards came to know, from the acknowledgment by the Americans, that
they possessed the right to their unceded lands, that Great Britain
had not given away their country at the peace ; as Governor Simcoe expressed
it, 'the only rights in the Indian Territories resigned by the King
to the United States were those against the nations of Europe.'

After
the Treaty of Paris, if England could have handed over the western country
to the United States , she would have been in no way concerned with
what was purely an American question. Unfortunately for the Indians,
their lands had become the property of the conquerors, and their title
de­pended upon the view which their masters would take of old treaties
and new duties. Great Britain could not actually interpose ; she could
only mediate, and was all the time strongly compromised in a way which
gave her less power over the Indians than she might have had under other
conditions. For during all this time that the conflict raged around
the Indian boundaries, the British flag waved over forts and posts far
within the American territory as defined by the treaty. Clauses v and
vi provided for the restitution of the losses of the loyalists and the
cessation of reprisals on the loyalists remaining in the United States
. These clauses had not been respected, and to enforce them Great Britain
had withheld the transfer of the western posts. So long as this semblance
of suzerainty was maintained, the Indians felt that they could claim
some protection, or at least advice, from their old ally. Brant's name
was as yet a tower of strength, and they looked to him as a mediator.
The Treaty of Fort Stanwix, consummated by their old friend Sir William
Johnson in 1768, fixed the Ohio as the western boundary of the colonies
; beyond that river the lands yet remained un­ceded to the white
man. All that the British could do after the peace to preserve the Indians'
title was to endeavour to assist in establishing a great belt of neutral
Indian territory between the Ohio and the Mississippi and the borders
of Canada.

INDIANS
HOSTILE TO THE UNITED STATES

But
the active hostilities of the Indians on the frontier hampered the American
settlements, and General St Clair was sent to crush the rebels, only
to be himself defeated in November 1791. During the following year efforts
were made to settle the question peacefully. Brant made a visit to Philadelphia
, and a grand council was arranged between the representatives of the
United States and the Indians for the spring of 1793. Meanwhile the
Indians themselves held counsel together, and listened with contempt
to the Six Nations' chiefs, who were taunted with having 'the voice
of the United States folded under their arm.' A preliminary council
was held in Freemasons' Hall one Sunday morning in July 1793. Three
commissioners from the United States were present, with Governor Simcoe,
several Quakers and others who were anxiously promoting a peaceful settlement.
Brant was the spokesman of the Confederates, and his party wished him
to ask whether the commission had the power to fix the Ohio as the boundary.
Ignoring the reference to the Ohio , he merely asked whether they were
empowered to fix the boundary. The answer was in the affirmative, but
if Brant had gained time he had lost all influence with the Confederate
Indians and weakened the confidence of the British.

More
than a month afterwards, near Detroit , to which point the commissioners
had proceeded, the question was decided. The Indians, filled with suspicion,
refused to receive the commissioners again, and sent an abrupt refusal
to consider any terms but their own. They claimed the Ohio as the boundary;
Brant and the Six Nations were willing to accept the restricted boundary
of the Ohio and the Musk­ingum, but the commissioners could agree
with neither. The negotiations were broken off, the Indians complaining
to Simcoe that the Americans insisted on taking the whole of their country,
and offered money, which was useless to them, in payment.

General
Wayne, who had organized an expedition against the Indians after the
defeat of St Clair, pressed still farther into their territory, and
his advances were considered a menace to the safety of the British posts.
Both Lord Dorchester and Governor Simcoe considered that the country
was on the eve of war, and prepared for it. But Wayne contented himself
with crushing the Indians, which he did on August 20, 1795, and, under
the terms of Jay's Treaty , Great Britain retired from the debatable
ground and from the western Indian problem. Once more, however, she
showed her generosity to the Indians by purchasing from the Chippewas
of the River Thames a tract of land for the western Indians, who, it
was supposed, would settle there to the number of three thousand, and
many of whom eventually moved to Canada. These events disrupted the
close connection of the Indians of Canada with the western nations;
but we shall realize again that the old heat had not died out of the
embers of the council fire when we see Tecumseh appearing out of the
West to assist the British in the War of 1812. It was even years after
that-in fact, not until the British restricted the issue of presents
to their own Indians that the bond of the old fealty was finally severed.

BRITISH
DIPLOMACY

It
is somewhat difficult to trace the course of British diplomacy throughout-
the tangle of this Indian territorial dispute, involved, as it was,
with the larger question of treaty obligations and the sovereignty of
the West. American writers have charged the British with, bad faith
and a desire to foment the Indian troubles ; they point to an active
interest manifested by the issue of ammunition and supplies. It would
be easy to exculpate and defend the British if the responsibility for
all orders, and all obedience to orders, lay in one direct channel from
the source onwards. But the separation between the executive government
and the Indian department, which gave rise to much protest, was in large
measure chargeable with the misunderstandings which made the action
of the British open to suspicion. It must be granted that in negotiations
with the Indians much that is important is often concealed. It is not
always the gentleman commissioner with gold lace on his coat who is
master of the situation ; some obscure parson, trader, or adventurer
is often the real pilot of events. There is a phrase full of meaning
which appears in the old records : 'The council fire was now covered
up.' When the council fire was thus 'covered up '.many other unofficial
blazes were kindled either for bane or benefit. The remoteness of the
posts, the time which passed between the dispatch of reports and the
receipt of orders, tended to make a consistent administration more difficult.
Tribute is due to such Indian officials as McKee, Claus and Elliot for
the fact that it was, in all essentials, successful. During the years
of strife after 1783 ammunition and other presents were constantly and
periodically issued to the Indians. These were for subsistence .only,
and were given as by a grand almoner to pensioners ; to withdraw them
would have meant inconceivable hardship to the recipient and a lasting
disgrace to the dispensing power. It is safe to take the British diplomacy
at its face value, and goodwill and a desire to settle the Indian question
peacefully are written plainly upon it. At the same time, there is evident
the desire to safeguard His Majesty's interests in Upper Canada . For
a long period, in fact until after the War of 1812, a certain fear of
the Indian runs through the dispatches from Upper Canada.

There
is no doubt that the administration of the Indian department was open
to criticism. In 1795 Governor Simcoe arraigned the policy which separated
the department in his province from the executive; the department was,
he averred, unpopular by reason of charges of peculation, arid 'from
belief that the officers foment ill-will between the Indians and the
United States.' He states : 'I therefore, if it shall continue on its
present independent footing, declare that I consider the power and authority
of my station, requisite for the good government and internal welfare
of the Province of Upper Canada, to be materially weakened.' His appeal
to the governor-general that the evil be remedied was effective, and
in 1796 the lieutenant-governor of Upper Canada was given control of
Indian affairs in his province.

JOSEPH
BRANT

So
long as the Indians were in the majority and under separate control,
the difficulties of administering the government, particularly in the
department of criminal justice, were great. The incident of the murder
of Lowell by Isaac Brant, one of Joseph Brant's sons, is a case in point.
Governor Simcoe was prepared to demand the surrender of the murderer;
if met by refusal, he had decided to support the civil power with
the whole military force of the country, and he had begun preparations.
The fear was that the execution or punishment of a brave would bring
the Indians into conflict with the settlers. In the case cited Isaac
died from a wound inflicted by his father in self-defence; and Brant,
showing his people an example of obedience to the law, gave himself
up to the authorities, and was acquitted of any criminal responsibility
for his son's death.

The
scroll of this uneasy period cannot be rolled up without a more distinct
reference to Joseph Brant, the master Indian of the time. He was not
a sachem of his nation, but only one of those elected chiefs of whom
mention has been made; yet he succeeded by his native force in placing
himself at the head of the Confederacy, the acknowledged arbiter between
civilized governments and the savage forces which opposed them. He was
fortunate in his early training in the school of Sir William Johnson
, being domesticated in his house by reason of the relations which existed
between his sister Molly and the baronet. He was educated ; he wrote
English in a rugged style, and translated portions of the Scriptures
and the Prayer Book into Mohawk. But his acquirement was less remarkable
than his native endowment. Shrewder, more cunning and deeper than any
other Mohawk, he had also a breadth of mind and a capacity for assimilating
the genius of European thought and politics. His intellectual vigour
impressed great men of various minds, and he played his part well, until,
as it would seem, he became confused amid the greatness of the contending
forces, and accepted, with the defeat of the policy of the western Indians,
his dwarfed position as the head of a disrupted league composed of dissatisfied
and truculent individuals. Yet even in this position one must recognize
his worth, and record that he worked diligently for his people. Altruism
is absent from the Indian character ; yet Brant's last words were for
his race : 'Have pity upon the poor Indians ; if you can get any influence
with the great, endeavour to do them all the good you can.'

-
IV -

THE
INDIANS AND THE WAR OF 1812

TECUMSEH,
A GREAT WAR CHIEF

ALTHOUGH
the general history of the War of 1812 does not come within the purview
of this chapter, certain space must be given to the share which the
Indians took in the defence of Upper and Lower Canada .

In
one particular the part they played was unique and final, as the western
Indians, who had never ceased their hatred of the United States , appear
for the last time as allies of the British. Tecumseh, the great chief
of the Shawnees , is the heroic Indian figure of this war. His steadfast
adherence to the policy of an alliance with Great Britain, when many
of his own and his confederate people were opposed to his diplomacy,
and his death for his adopted cause, will always surround his fame with
a lustre of romance. He was born in 1768, the year of the great Treaty
of Fort Stanwix, and he had taken part as a young man in the turbulent
times between 1783 and 1796. The Indians had observed the tone of hostility
which the Americans had adopted toward the British, and it had thrown
them into a state of feverish unrest. On November 7, 1811, in the absence
of Tecumseh, they had attacked General Harrison and had inflicted
upon him considerable loss. Harrison followed them up only to find the
deserted village of Tippecanoe , which he destroyed. Tecumseh,. when
he returned in January 1812 from his mission to the Creeks in the south,
found the desolate site of the once prosperous village.

On
December 3, 1811, General Brock writes in a letter to Governor Craig:

"My
first care, on my arrival in this province, was to direct the officers
of the Indian Department at Amherstburg to exert their whole
influence with the Indians to prevent the attack, which I understood
a few tribes meditated against the American frontier. But their efforts
proved fruitless, as such was the infatuation of the Indians, that
they refused to listen to advice ; and they are now so deeply engaged
that I despair of being able to withdraw them from the contest in
time to avert their destruction. A high degree of fanaticism, which
has been for years working in their minds, has led to the present
event."

He
reports again : 'The Indians felt that they had been sacrificed in 1794,
they are eager to avenge their injuries.' Suasion and advice were of
no avail ; Tecumseh with over a thousand of his warriors crossed the
frontier into Upper Canada, and met General Brock in August of 1812.
Brock thus describes his fellow-warrior:

"He
who most attracted my attention was the Shawanee chief, Tecumseh,
who for the last two years has carried on, contrary to our remonstrances,
an active warfare against the United States. A more sagacious or more
gallant warrior does not, I believe, exist. He was the admiration
of every one who conversed with him. From a life of dissipation, he
has not only become in every respect abstemious, but he has likewise
prevailed on all his nation, and many of the other tribes, to follow
his example."

ABLE
ALLIES ON MANY FIELDS

The
defection of Tecumseh drew from the Americans the most violent threats
of extermination, which were even extended to include those white soldiers
who might be captured fighting side by side with the Indians. But the
Indians fought throughout the war, in their fashion, supporting the
regular troops and the militia; and their share in the victories and
defeats of the campaigns was marked with but one act of treachery, the
massacre of some American prisoners after the affair at Frenchtown.
They were present at every important engagement-at the capture of Detroit,
at Queenston Heights, at the defences of York and Fort George, at the
Thames, at Beaver Dam and Lundy's Lane, with de Salaberry at Chateauguay,
and with Morrison's column at Chrystler's Farm. Not a few Indians were
lost in the British cause, including Tecumseh, who was shot at the battle
of the Thames , and whose burial-place is shrouded in mystery. In the
Treaty of Ghent, which closed the war, the Indians were not forgotten.
Brock had pleaded their cause before his death, and had urged that in
any negotiations for peace they should not be 'exposed to the unrelenting
fury of their enemies.' Clause ix of the treaty read as follows : 'Hostilities
to cease with the Indian tribes ; all the possessions, rights and privileges
enjoyed by them previous to 1811 to be restored.' The losses of the
Indians during this war amounted to £4,750 ; the claims were paid
by the government.

On
August 8, 1814, a general order was issued stating that the commander
of the forces had approved of a plan for the organization of a body
of Indian warriors, to act together in the field under a superintendent
as colonel, and to consist of four companies from Caughnawaga, the Lake
of Two Mountains, St Regis, St Francis, Bécancour and Three Rivers.
The officers of this corps received the same pay as officers of corresponding
rank in the regular army. The corps served until July 24, 1815, when
it was disbanded.

During
the rebellion of 1837-38 the Indians remained loyal, and in one instance
rendered invaluable service to the government. On November 4, 1838 ,
an attempt was made by a body of the insurgents to surprise the Caughnawaga
Indians. It was Sunday, and the Indians, who were in church, were warned
by a squaw of the intended attack. They defeated their antagonists and
took seventy prisoners, whom they handed over to the authorities in
Montreal the next day. Their gallant conduct was made the subject of
a commendatory dispatch from Lord Glenelg to Sir John Colborne, dated
January 26, 1839.

-
V -

LOYAL
WARDS OF THE CROWN

INDIAN
RESERVES IN CANADA

With
the gradual settlement of the Indians in the province of Upper Canada
, the administration of Indian lands grew to be the most important question
with which the government had to deal. The land question had two main
divisions-the unceded lands and the reserved lands. In the lower province
the crown simply maintained the state of affairs existing before the
Conquest. There were no unceded lands in Lower Canada . There the Indians
were found settled upon reserves which had been granted either to missionaries
for the purpose of evangelizing the Indians, or to the Indians themselves
by the crown or private persons. Some of these titles are of ancient
date. The reserve at Caughnawaga was granted in 1680 to the Jesuits
for the Mohawks whom they had converted, and who had occupied an older
Caughnawaga in the Mohawk Valley. In the year 1762 this reserve was
withdrawn from the management of the Jesuit Order, and the fee simple
was retained by the crown for the benefit of the Indians. Another reserve,
that of the Abnakis of St Francis, was donated by Dame Crevier to be
held as a reserve so long as a Jesuit missionary was there maintained.
In the upper province, when the Constitutional Act of 1791 became operative,
vast areas of land were in possession of the Indians. The purchase of
the tract from the Mississagas for the Mohawks was an early application
of the principle of the Proclamation of 1763, and no sooner had Governor
Simcoe seated himself in his province than he began to extinguish the
Indian interest in the lands, and place the Indians upon reserves set
apart as their own peculiar estate, inalienable without their consent.
Large parts of Upper Canada were thus relieved of the burden of the
Indian title before 1841. The consideration was usually an annuity and
sometimes a direct purchase. The more important cessions were as follows:

MOHAWKS
OF THE BAY OF QUINTE

July
20, 1820

33,280

Township
of Tyendinaga

450 0 0

(annuity)

MORAVIANS
OF THE THAMES

Oct.
25, 1836

26,000

Township
of Zone

150 0 0

(annuity)

The
reserved lands began also to be surrendered to the crown for sale, the
proceeds to be invested for the benefit of the Indian owners. The Mohawks
at an early date began to sell and lease portions of the Grand River
tract. The Mississagas surrendered their reserves at the River Credit,
and in 1841 the Indian Trust Fund accumulated from these land sales
amounted to £8321.

EARLY
CONDITION OF THE INDIANS

Early
Indian legislation was confined to the regulation of the fur trade and
the suppression of the traffic in intoxicants. During the French regime
ordinances provided these regulations, and also prohibited the purchase
of Indian clothing and protected the cultivated lands of the natives
from encroachment. After the Conquest, and until the Indians found themselves
a distinct factor in a developed settlement and society, British legislation
was of a like character. Before 1791 a few simple ordinances derivative
from the Proclamation of 1763 will be found. Between 1791 and 1841 a
little elaboration on the old theme is noticeable with the introduction
of a new note, a recognition that the Indian who gained his subsistence
by the chase should not be subject to the game laws. Special enactments
gradually appeared on the statute book, as necessity arose, to provide
for the peculiar position of a people who were wards in some of their
relations to the government, yet at the same time free citizens of a
free country. In these early days they were savages living an aboriginal
life with some rough acquirements of civilization. In Upper Canada they
lived until nearly the middle of the nineteenth century in their wigwams.
The Six Nations were hut-builders, but their huts, if as sanitary, were
little better than the wigwams. In Lower Canada the Indians had learned
the benefit of permanent shelters, and were housed for the most part,
though in a rudimentary way.

The
plentiful supply of fish and game gave them a staple food-supply, and
they were a well-nourished race capable of great endurance. They had
cultivated and improved the maize, of which there were several varieties.
It was used in many forms : green, it was boiled, roasted, or made into
loaf-bread ; dried, it was made into cake, soups and puddings, with
and without meat. They also cultivated beans and squashes, and used
lichens, mushrooms and fungi, with berries, nuts and edible roots. They
made sugar from the maple sap, and their diet was varied and nutritious.
Their domestic utensils had been gradually improved to meet their primitive
needs. They had invented the bark canoe and the snow-shoe. Before they
had tasted the fierce liquor imported by the white man their condition
was one of plenty. The improvidence with which they are usually charged
was not an ancient characteristic, as they used granaries and storehouses,
and husbanded their resources. But rum was let loose on them like a
scourge, and destroyed them. Despite the restriction on the traffic,
traders bartered liquor for furs, and the final price that would purchase
anything and everything was a keg of rum or hollands. It was not until
the trade in intoxicants was made absolutely illegal that the Indian
began to recover a little of his ancient dignity and independence.

From
the close of the Revolutionary War until nearly the middle of the nineteenth
century the Indian government was conducted by means of a constant appeal
to self-interest; amity was promoted by a system of gifts which became
in the end degrading. The simple primitive interchange of tokens of
friendship between the early discoverers and the chiefs had become so
debased that it was a source of peculation to the whites and debauchery
to the natives. But consideration of the question of Indian presents
may well be deferred until recording the reasons which led to their
abolishment, when there will be opportunity for a perspicuous review
of the subject.

RELIGIOUS
INSTRUCTION AND EDUCATION

In
a word, during the period under consideration the Indians were still
savages; and although some effort had been made to christianize and
educate, it had left the temper and disposition of the tribes unregenerate.
The Jesuit missionaries had laboured in New France, and their self-sacrifice
had influenced the outward demeanour of the savage, and made him a participant
in the exercises of religion. In the British colonies matters were not
so advanced. Johnson expressed the fear in 1763 that no such persons
as the Jesuits would be found amongst the clergy. The British colonists'
greed for land had greatly destroyed the influence of their missionaries
with the Indians, and the Mohawks had lately told Johnson 'that they
apprehended the reason they had not clergy as formerly amongst them
was because they had no more land to spare.' Portions of the Scriptures
and the whole of the Prayer Book had been translated into Iroquois,
and there were in the Mohawk and Oneida nations little centres of Christianity.

When
the settlement of Upper Canada began, greater attention was at first
paid to the religious instruction and education of the Indian than to
like service for the white population. The first school in the province
was for the Mohawks, who settled on the shores of the Bay of Quinte
; the first church erected was on the Grand River reservation of the
Mohawks. Missionaries of the Gospel were active in the villages of the
Chippewas and Mississagas, and several Indians became prominent in the
civil life of the province. John Brant, the son of chief Joseph Brant,
was in 1832 elected a member of the provincial parliament. The county
of Haldimand extended over the grant to the Mohawks. Brant had been
elected to represent this county by the votes of persons who held their
property under leases granted by his father, and the courts had decided
that the title in fee simple was not held by the Indians. Brant's opponent,
Colonel Warren, contested the election, and he was unseated; but he
was worthy both by natural gifts and education of the honour the people
had paid him.

CONDUCT
OF THE INDIAN DEPARTMENT

THE
JOHNSON TRADITION

IN
the constitution of the Indian department few changes were made during
the years between 1763 and 1830. Until the death of Sir John Johnson
in 1830 the department was governed by the Johnson tradition.

After
Sir William Johnson's death Colonel Guy Johnson was appointed to his
office temporarily by General Thomas Gage, and afterwards permanently
on September 8, 1774. He held the position until February 1782, when
he was suspended owing to irregularities in the department. Upon reorganization
Sir John Johnson, Sir William's son, was appointed by royal commission
on March 14, 1782, superintendent-general and inspector-general, and
continued to administer until June 25, 1828, when the office was abolished
and his name was placed upon the pension list.

A
deputy superintendent-general had been appointed in 1794 in the person
of Colonel Alexander McKee. Both these titles and offices survive under
the Federal government, the major being a minister of the crown, and
the minor the deputy minister of the department of Indian Affairs. When
Colonel McKee died on January 15, 1799, a controversy arose over the
appointment of his successor, owing to a dispute as to whether the patronage
of the department was under civil or military control. The Duke of Kent,
as commander-in-chief, appointed Colonel John Connolly; Lieutenant-Governor
Hunter promoted Captain William Claus, informing the Duke of Portland
that he would not recognize Colonel Connolly ; he also wrote to the
Duke of Kent that the removal of Captain Claus would he highly prejudicial
to His Majesty's service. Upon these representations, the Duke of York
ordered the cancellation of Colonel Connolly's appointment. Captain
Claus was promoted to the rank of colonel, and served until his death
in November 1826. Inspector-General Darling succeeded him, and when
the office of superintendent-general was abolished in 1828, and the
administration devolved upon a chief superintendent, he was the first
occupant of that office. His headquarters were at Montreal, and his
salary was six hundred pounds.

CHANGING
POLICIES

A
general order of August 13, 1816, directed, by command of the secretary
of state for the Colonies, that the superintendence and chief control
of the Indian department and of all Indian affairs be transferred to
the military commander of the North-West provinces. Thereafter the administration
was military in character ; the officers had military rank, and were
entitled to wear a uniform which was established by order in 1823. It
consisted of a jacket of olive-green cloth, made in the same manner
as -those worn by the infantry regiments of the line, with gold lace
round the collar and cuffs, and gilt buttons with the crown and name
of the department upon them ; waistcoat and pantaloons of the same colour
; a common round hat with cockade and button ; and a waist-belt and
sabre - the superintendent-general and deputy superintendent-general,
only, to wear a gold epaulette on each shoulder. Until 1832 they were
paid from the military chest provided for the use of the Army Extraordinaries
; after that date from the imperial grant for the Indian department.
Their duties have been described as consisting of 'conveying the presents
to the Indians and attending at the different stations where they assembled
to receive them with as much military pomp and display as the occasion
would admit.'

In
1830, when Sir George Murray was secretary of state for the Colonies,
an end was made of the exclusively military character of the administration.
It was divided territorially into departments for Upper and Lower Canada
. The former was controlled by the lieutenant-governor, at that time
Sir John Colborne, with Colonel James Givens as chief superintendent
; the latter, by the military secretary of the governor-general at Quebec,
then Lieutenant-Colonel Cooper. Lieutenant-Colonel D. C. Napier was
secretary of Indian Affairs for Lower Canada, with the pay of a chief
superintendent.

This
organization continued until after the formation of the Province of
Canada , and subsequent modifications and changes will be referred to
in their proper sequence.

During
the long period of seventy-eight years, from 1763 to 1841, which is
now under review, the crown, from a wise view of the situation, retained
the management of the Indians. The policy which centred the control
of the Indians in the only power free from local prejudice is easily
comprehended. In the early days the Indians were either feared as foes
or valued as allies; and as their chief importance was military their
government, it was wisely felt, was safe in the hands of those who must
control them in the field. When the immediate fear of war faded away,
the prudence of continuing unabated the care with which old treaties
and traditions were honoured and preserved, and the sheer necessity
of protect­ing the Indian estate from the rapacity of land-grabbers
and speculators, led to the survival of the dominance of the governor-general
over the Indians and their affairs long after the colonial ministry
was responsible for the general government.

When
in 1830 the secretary of state for the Colonies terminated the existence
of what may be called the military Indian department he made more than
a mere change and improvement in administrative methods. The Indian
officers were no longer to be solely purveyors of presents or almoners
of the crown grants ; they were to be transformed into the executants
of a humane and progressive plan for the civiliza­tion of the aborigines.
Sir George Murray announced as the policy of the government 'the settled
purpose of gradually reclaiming the Indians from a state of barbarism,
and intro­ducing amongst them the industrious and peaceful habits
of civilized life.'

The
years which had passed between 1796 and 1830 had made possible such
a change of policy. At the latter date the majority of the western Indians
had elected to which of the two governments they were to own allegiance.

The
years ensuing between 1841 and 1867 will show the inception and development
of many new ideas in Indian policy, the beginnings of a generous scheme
of education, a still wider application of the principle of purchase
of land­rights, and the gradual evolution of the legal status of
the wards of the crown. Details of the later progress will be recorded
in dealing with the relations of the provinces of Canada, Nova Scotia,
New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island with the Indians.